Letter to Superintendents

November 1, 2007

TO THE ADMINISTRATOR ADDRESSED:

Subject: Instructions to Activate New Online Research and Information Resources for Libraries in Public Schools

Good news for Texas public schools! Through Rider 88, the 80th Texas Legislature has funded online research and information resources for all libraries in public schools. These resources are available to educators, students, and their immediate families at school or home through a partnership with the Texas Education Agency, the Texas State Library and Archives Commission (TSLAC), and Education Service Center Region 20. The resources are funded through the technology allotment.

In 2005, the Texas Legislature directed TSLAC to negotiate subscriptions to online resources for school campuses. School campuses paid the subscription costs for these resources during the 2006-2007 school year. Over two million students on almost 3,600 campuses accessed electronic resources through this program. Legislative supporters wanted to make sure that these resources were made available to every public school campus, not just those that could afford access. Rider 88 accomplishes this goal.

Thirty-four online databases from EBSCO Publishing with three age-appropriate interfaces for K-12 were made available in September 2007. They support K-12 learning with reference materials for students at every grade level. These include full-text articles from newspapers and magazines; maps and charts; photographs; educational and health reports; historical and current event information; biographies; country and state reports, and much more. Educators will also find professional journals and research studies.

Britannica Online School Edition will be added to the K-12 Databases package on December 1, 2007. The School Edition serves K-12 students with four complete encyclopedias in English and two in Spanish, as well as atlases, dictionaries, timelines and more than 600 multimedia-rich student activities. Both learning materials and encyclopedia articles are aligned to the TEKS. Britannica's online reference resources are available in Spanish, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, and French.

A Fact Sheet with more information is available at any of the following websites:
http://www.texshare.edu/k12;
http://www.tea.state.tx.us/imet/libraries; or
http://web.esc20.net/k12databases.

You can activate your account to access these resources by going to http://web.esc20.net/k12databases/activation.htm. If you have questions, please contact the ESC-20 Help Desk at k12help@esc20.net or call 210-370-5623. Please share this information with your teachers, librarians, administrators, students, and students' immediate families, and take advantage of these valuable online learning resources!

Sincerely,